Uttar Pradesh: 3 charged with forcing Aligarh student to urinate on Pakistan flag

A video circulating on social media purporting to show a mob surrounding a youngster and forcing him to urinate on a Pakistani flag laying on a road here has prompted police to launch an investigation and charge three people. The Samajwadi Party's Aligarh district unit condemned the event as an attempt to incite communal division in the aftermath of last week's Pahalgam terror assault, which murdered 26 people, the majority of whom were tourists.

In a police report, the 15-year-old student's family stated that he was going home from Government Inter College with friends on Monday afternoon when he discovered the flag on the ground and picked it up out of curiosity. Moments after, a throng approached the youngster, demanding to know his identity, began harassing him, and forced him to urinate on the flag, the report alleged. The video showed a visibly distressed youngster appealing and saying that he had taken up the flag out of curiosity.

An FIR was filed late Monday night at the Banna Devi police station, and three accused, including one nameless, were charged under various provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.